woman engaging with laptopA practicum placement facilitating online sessions for ESL students will give teacher candidates valuable experience.

Facilitating sessions for English learners to provide experience for teacher candidates

A practicum placement facilitating online extracurricular sessions for students of the English Language Improvement Program (ELIP) will give teacher candidates valuable experience, say partners leading the project.

Anouchka Plumb, manager of language programs in Continuing Education, and doctoral candidate in education Anita Toronyi will direct the effort through the Faculty of Education’s service learning course in English as a Second Language.

“This is an exciting collaboration because it fulfils the service learning objectives of exposing mainstream teachers to learners with English as an additional language and giving them facilitation experience in the field,” says Toronyi.

Participants completing the 20-hour practicum receive a certificate of practicum completion evidencing their “learning by doing” and adding to their professional portfolios.

“For ELIP students, the extracurricular sessions support them in exploring topics of interest while continuing to focus on strengthening their communication skills,” Dr. Plumb says. “It was also imperative for the program to review creative opportunities for ELIP student social connection in the online community that can be sustained beyond remote learning days in response to the pandemic.”

The sessions will engage the students in discussions on:

  • Canadian Geography
  • Grammar Attack
  • Study Success
  • Confident Online Speaking 
  • Canada in the News
  • Critical Thinking Hub
  • Leadership Matters
  • Mini-Lecture Series

Plumb says Continuing Education seeks more faculty members interested in innovative cross-disciplinary collaboration. She encourages anyone with an idea to reach out at aplumb@uwindsor.ca.

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